Book: Don’t Panic: Taking Control of Anxiety Attacks by R. Reid Wilson. Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.

A good book and exactly what I needed, thanks for the recommendation, Rafael Rosa!

Some people said it seems like a Rust programming language book because of the word “panic” but it’s actually related to panic/anxiety attacks. It’s not the first time I suffer from anxiety but it’s the first time I felt the panic attack symptoms, so I decided to read more about it.

This book describes most (all?) of the symptoms that a panic attack causes and some ways to deal with it. There are many extreme cases being described here, which actually helps to find your own problems much less disturbing.

The book tries to provide a set of tools to help you fight it yourself. The description of how anxiety works and how we make it worse is not new to me, but the tools the book tries to provide will probably be a good addition to my toolbox. :)

Below are my notes. They are more personal than usual since I was reading with my own situation in mind.

  • For patients with emphysema and bronchitis, the fear of being breathless seem to be at the root of most of their problems
  • There’s a feeling that the body is in a “dream-like state”, called depersonalization
  • The first panic attack seems to come out of nowhere, but it usually appears after a long period of stress (change of jobs, promotion, the birth of a child, etc)
  • For some people, managing to reduce the stress fix the panic attack problems, for others, the panic appears to show them some psychological trait and they start to be doubtful of their skills to handle the situation
  • In the gastro-interspinal system, anxiety causes the symptoms of difficulty in swallowing, butterflies in the stomach, the gurgling sounds in the stomach and intestines, diarrhea, and cramp-like pains in the upper stomach.
  • Some circumstances make people face fear instead of letting it become panic. Facing fear when it appears is a more effective way to not let it grow
  • Do not reject compliments with self-deprecating comments. Just say thank you.
  • If you ignore your feelings, they will grow and grow. Once they are so big you can’t ignore them, they scare you instead
  • We have breath patterns in many situations and feelings. People with lung diseases may not react well to some of those patterns.
  • As soon as they start thinking negatively about the future, they fall into the panic trap. She (in this case) feels a smothering feeling, which brings all the other feelings
  • Don’t keep monitoring your body all the time, let your unconscious mind to take care of it. Your unconscious mind does it very well, all the time, just share your burden with it without worrying too much
  • If you felt panic once, your brain may have created a cue to activate the emergency system next time it felt any symptoms. You have to learn to deactivate the emergency mode when there’s no real danger to worry about.
  • Don’t avoid situations where panic may happen, learn to cope with it and face the fear. Being against panic only makes your anxiety worse. Learn to face your discomfort.
  • Most problems with anxiety come from the fear of uncertainty. Living demands risk. 0 risk is too much to require from life. Questions like “Can I know for certain that I will not …?” are a real problem and you need to confront them and learn to accept risk.
  • Being open about panic attacks makes things easier as you are preparing the environment for not being ashamed if something happens. Such behavior helps to reduce the anxiety
  • Removing the demand for success actually increases the chances of os success.
  • Challenge panic or anxiety (as if they are separate entities) to generate even more fear or catastrophic scenarios. You can handle this and see that nothing catastrophic will happen. It’s just a test, you don’t need to worry.
  • Observe things without taking action from your observations. Instead of judging a symptom when you start feeling it, take some time to consider the whole situation and remember this is not an emergency, so your body will have a better reaction. When you assess a symptom as the worst-case scenario, your body pushes the panic button to protect yourself as if it was a life-threatening situation
  • Create a supportive observer to support yourself and directly face your negative observer (who says everything is a catastrophic experience)
  • Fight against what you are feeling only makes things worse. Try to shift your thoughts away from what you’re feeling
  • The trouble with our conscious mind is that it tries too hard
  • She hardest task for concentration is to quiet your conscious mind